Telecom. IT: Teleccomunication sector in Romania reports incomes dropping by 5% in 2024

  Incomes of telecommunications sector in Romania dropped by 5% last year, against 2023, to 16.1 billion lei (about 3.2 billion euros), according to data released on Friday by the National Authority for Administration in Communications (ANCOM). The statistic data report of the local administration market shows that the income drop in 2024 was based mainly on wholesale tele[hone services. The fixed and mobile Internet generated 40% of incomes, mobile telephony 29%, TV program re-broadcasting 15%, fixed telephony 8%, other types of networks/services 8%.   Based on incomes obtained from supplying networks and services of electronic communications, the suppliers' top included: Orange (36%), Digi (29%) and Vodafone (24%). As for fixed Internet connections, Gigabit connections grew by 16% to 2.4 millions, mainly on the background of an 8% increase of the number of optic fiber connections (FTTH) to 5.4 millions in 2024.   At general level, fixed Internet connections recorded an increse of 3% to 6.8 millions, most of them (95%) allowing speeds exceeding 100 Mbps. At the same time, 35% of connections allow speeds of at least 1Gbps. The average monthly traffic reached 88 GB/person (+10%), the equivalent of 3 GB/day. At the same time, the fixed Internet coverage rate per 100 households was 83% (89% in the urban area and 75% in the rural area).   According to the number of connections, the first three suppliers are: Digi (72%), Orange (16%) and Vodafone (10%).   ANCOM data point aout that in the case of mobile Internet, the number of active connections grew to 21.7 millions, of which 18.6 millions used 4G and/or 5G. In context, the number of 5G connections grew by 53% in 2024, reaching 3.5 millions (16% of total).   Moreover, about 21 million connections were made via mobile phones, while the average monthly traffic was 13 GB/capita (+18%), over 400 MB daily. According to the official ANCOM report, according to the number of active connections, the top of mobile Internet suppliers included: Orange (35%), Digi (30%) and Vodafone (22%).   As for mobile telephony, the ANCOM statistics show that last year, there were 22.8 million active SIM cards (-30% against 2023) of which 74% based on subscription. Also, the increase of the number of subscription SIM cards (plus 1 million) did not compensate the significant drop of the number of prepaid active card users (-1.8 millions).   The voice traffic also droppped by 3%, from one year to the other, to 58 billion minutes, that is 4 hours and 15 minutes/month/capita.   According to the number of active SIM cards, Orange had a market share of 35%, followed by Digi – 28% and Vodafone – 25%.   In the television chapter, the number of subscriptions for TV re-bradcasting was 7.8 millions, with a continuous subscriber migration from satellite /DTH services (-138,000) to cable (+188,000 subscribers). In the 12 months of 2024, Digi had a market share of 75%, Orange 13% and Vodafone 9%.   Figures referring to the electronic communications market in Romania for semester 2, 2024, are based on statistic data reported by suppliers which have to inform ANCOM about values of service categories indicators, according to decision 333/2013.